O Christmas Tree & Some Bits from the Back Garden

I'd mentioned in my last post that Kevin and I get an IKEA tree.  The price is right -  $20.00.  For that you get your pick of bundled trees in a large lot.  The tricky part is that you're unable to see what the tree looks like.  Aside from how tall, how straight and how the top looks, you have no idea what it will look like.  So I always consider this the first surprise of the Christmas season.

Here's how it looked in our old battered Christmas stand upon entry to the house:

And how it looked if you're sitting at the dining room table:

After an hour, some careful untwisting of branches and gentle fluffing and coaxing - here's our tree - not bad?

This year I was going to put on white and gold lights - I discovered that the gold lights had finally decided that enough was enough after 15 years of service.

Back into the storage area for more white lights.  New dotty ribbon from Costco:

Continuing on the next morning after about 30 minutes of ornament placing:

Hercules loves this time of year.  He wishes this giant tree laden with cat toys was up all year long.  Remember our old cat Fast Eddie who used to do his mountain lion imitation after the tree was decorated....Remember Kevin saying, "Barbara walk very slowing and speaking softly and maybe he'll climb out of the tree and into your arms without knocking the whole thing over."

After another 30 minutes or so:

Looking at it here, looks like I favoured the left side over the right....,

And, first deadline met - tree ready for my mother-in-law Bernice (85 in January on the left) - and her good friend Eileen's Christmas lunch.  Discovered that making my own mincemeat is worthwhile - so delicious.  And, knowing how much suet is involved, am inclined to eat a lot less.

On to the next task, you may remember me talking about my containers.  Hmmm.  Think that most of this greenery will be on my dining room table.

Got the Oakville Horticultural Society newsletter finished early this month and decided to go into the garden to take a few shots when I saw the sun come out.  It's so warm (5C - 43F) that I scooted down the stairs in my slippers and light sweater.    A coat would have been better, but skipping this step meant I got some of the good light.

One of the bushy forms of clematis.  I downloaded a free trial of Elements - used one portion of it to fix one of the people photos in the newsletter - darned if I can remember how I did it now.  But hoping over the next few weeks to be able to play with the software using photos like these to see how I can improve them.

This is a Ligularia that was stunted by the heat and dry this year.  Has pretty good seed heads, but they are much shorter.

Another Clematis - this has a single white flower.

Hydrangea quercifolia can't remember the variety off the top of my head, but is definitely greener than the species at the front of the house.

A very rewarding Carex morrowii  'Ice Dance'.

It started to get windy, so these Campanula seed heads started to wiggle.  Remember listening to a professional photographer who said, "You must just stay very still and wait for your subject to be still with you."  Nice thought, too cold without my coat.

Much easier when they're just lying on the ground.  Stormy tonight, but it looks like it will be rain, not snow.  Seems a little like a repeat of last year's non-winter, which is just fine for getting around and about.  Doesn't look like it's going to be a white Christmas.